Having been around the yoga world for a good time now, I’ve observed that yogis (broadly speaking) fall into one of three categories. If you’ve been coming to yoga for a while, see if you recognise yourself here:

1) Your parents are called Gayatri and Moonbeam*. You grew up taking yoga classes because your parents didn’t want you playing sports with children rendered savage by meat-eating. You don’t like to use the self sign-in computers in studios because that would mean having to touch electricity. You regularly bring percussion instruments to class.

2) You came to yoga from a dance or gymnastics background. You can regularly be heard asking for abdominal exercises, even though the teacher has patiently explained many times that this is a restorative class. Your favourite Zen koan is the one that goes ‘if you perform a beautiful pincha mayurasana and there’s no one around to Instagram it, did it really happen?’ By your fifth yoga class, you are often the teacher.

3) You are still getting over the end of a relationship. In 2001. Since coming to yoga you can at least open a second bottle of wine without finishing it. You like the studio because everyone is too nice to talk about you behind your back. You never find out about events at your shala from Facebook, because you aren’t allowed an account anymore.

Recognise yourself? If not, perhaps it’s time for a little more self-inquiry….